Searching for the perfect college

OK- Now is the time to get out a pad of paper.

Brainstorm the things with your student that are most important to them in a university. I know, you will want to add your 2 cents worth. Fear not, you too will have some input in the process!

Take the brainstorming list and make a new list giving each of the items a rating of importance on a scale of 1-5. 5 is more important than 1.

Your list will look something like this:

Location (listing the state or town) 5
Size (small, medium, large) 5
Boy/girl ratio: 3
Major: 5
Cost: 2
(This could take up an entire page or more)

You get the idea!

Once you get the list figured out, (did I mention this list and the value of importance for each item will likely change a number of time over the course of your search?) you will be ready for the next step.

Researching the colleges.

The college search process can and will be as simple or as difficult as you want it to be. Perhaps your child is at the top of their class and know they want to go to an ivy league school. Perhaps your child will go to (they hope) the same university their mom/dad/siblings went to.

A large number of students choose to go to school in their home state. Don't think that makes your job any easier. Have you taken a good look at the number of colleges in your home state? I just did a quick look for the state of Virgina......here there are over 75. Yikes!

Another large number of students will choose to go to university in one of the neighboring state....Hmmmm. Figure about 4 states-times that by 75. Now you've got it!

If your child is the typical overextended overachiever, they will find little time to move forward on the process until the last minute. If you are OK with that scenario, I applaud you. Me, I am not fond of ulcers and preferred my time investment to the stomach ache alternative!

We went to Princetonreview.com first and did the somewhat lengthy questionnaire called Counselor-O-Matic to get a list of suggested universities.

The next phase was my part. I went through each suggested university by going to the Princeton Review link about it. All the statistics are listed that you have on your list and more you never though of. Once of the features I always looked at was: The College Says/The Students Say. Remember this will be part of getting the big picture.

If the college looked like a possibility based on the list my daughter created, I saved the school in the favorites list and and sent my daughter a link for the university web site. After she looked at the website, she would give me a yes/no and so it went. At one point, there were over 100 colleges on the favorites list!

Within the Princeton Review is a little addition that will show you similar schools and schools within the area. We often found other schools not on the "recommended" list.

This is where you also add in the colleges that you have already thought about or heard about. Add those to the favorites list.

Now, if you are the parent of a Freshman or Sophomore you can pause for awhile. Keep going back and checking the list. Add or delete as priorities change.

If your child is a Junior, soldier on. If your child is a Senior, fortify yourself.

The research won't stop here. Below I have listed some links of other websites. You will find rankings, reviews and more.

Theoretically this search will have taken place no later than the beginning of the Junior year of school.

If your student is a Junior, now is the time for them to start editing their choices. All your research will pay off at this point because decision making is so much easier when you are armed with information.

I made a time-line for my daughter. She had to be down to 50 schools by the end of December. We were living abroad so we had more time leeway. If you are living in the U.S. the list should be down to 20-25 by this time.

"Wait!", you say, there are still 100 schools on the list. This is how the list gets smaller fast. It is up to your child to write a letter of inquiry to each university they are interested in.

Have them type a general letter that they can cut and paste. In the letter, they should introduce themselves, tell their interests, their grade point average, extra-curriculars, etc. When they have a well written short letter, they need to find out the name of the admissions counselor for their state and email them directly. Most kids are NOT interested in sending 100+ letters!

Make sure to make a folder on your desktop where you can make folders inside of each university on the list. Place all correspondence inside the folder for future reference. Some if not many of the schools will send auto response if they don't send their letter to a real person. Some of these letters will also help cut the interest level down.

Congratulations. You and your child have reached the end of December. Everyone is still alive and your are ready for the next step.

Drum roll please........................

I suggest spending the spring of Junior year visiting schools. And yes, visiting 20-25 colleges is possible and a VERY, VERY good idea. We did it and we survived.

My next lens: You want me to visit how many colleges?????

Visit the Isle of Squid

The Isle of Squid Leave a review if you would for Searching for the Perfect College